Posts filed under 'Sunny The Pug'

First of all, I think it’s absolute CRUST that people are behaving as though they are above the royal wedding. Now, listen, I get if it’s Not Your Thing, but you don’t have to act like you’re cooler than me because you’re not interested. Come on! COME ON! It’s this bizarre antiquated institution full of bizarre mores and customs and yes, Charles and Diana’s wedding was a TOTAL SHAM, but for the LOVE, it’s still stupidly exciting. It’s watching CELEBRITIES GET MARRIED, and if you think I wouldn’t have tuned in when Jennifer Aniston and Brad Pitt got married (RIP, Brad & Jen), you are seriously off your rocker.

I’m not even a WEDDING PERSON, but if I can tune that shiznit in from the comfort of my own home, with Twitter at the ready and perhaps a mimosa? I am so there. In fact, if you follow me on Twitter and don’t want my unsolicited, unfiltered opinions on the wedding, perhaps it’s best if you unfollow me on Sunday FRIDAY DUH SORRY. I won’t be offended, so long as you come back when it’s over.

This weekend I wrapped up a couple of work proposals, and I realized today that if they come through, I might … um, hire someone to help with part-time child care. I just … well. It dawns on me that most people do their work during the day and are sort of kind of done at night, save for some loose ends, and don’t spend every minute of their free time trying to cram an ENTIRE DAY’S WORTH OF WORK into four hours every nap/night, and wait wait, this is why people have work days and … hm, maybe I want to reevaluate some things here, eh? I’m not talking a LOT, just a few hours here and there and … well, I popped the childcare panic-cherry by enrolling her in preschool and apparently it’s a slippery slope that I’m pretty comfortable with, and also, this is a no-shitter to most of you, but forgive me, I AM SLOW.

Speaking of slow, on at least two occasions recently, I have been reminded of and/or once again experienced the type of parents who, and I hope I explain this properly, seem to actually believe that their kids really ARE superior to every other child on earth, and fail to grasp that it might be — just a little — colored by the fact that they are the parents, you know? Like, I’ve had multiple conversations, and I KNOW y’all have too, with parents who talk about their smart, glorious children in a way that suggests, somehow, that I’m supposed to be jealous of their children? As though I would … trade my child for theirs, or somehow think that my (perfect, brilliant) offspring is INFERIOR to theirs and I got a dud model? Or … that your parenting MUST be better than mine, and OH TEACH ME, JEDI.

Look, we’re all proud of our kids. I think Sam is the most amazing person I’ve ever met, or likely ever will meet. I find her endlessly fascinating and funny and of course, I believe she’s exceptionally smart and beautiful, but I ALSO recognize that I am her MOTHER and thus, it is my job to believe those things. And as a mother, I also realize that you, a bystander, might not feel the same way, because it’s not really your job to feel that way, and honestly, I might find it a little creepy if you did.

Am I … making sense? I mean, yes, I share stories of her, and how funny she is, but I recognize that *I* think she’s funny, and I would never talk about her as though she is the FUNNIEST CHILD WHO EVER LIVED, because I realize that’s probably not true (there are other mothers out there, of course), and also, that’s obnoxious. And yet, you would be amazed at the number of people who do NOT recognize this fact.

Further, this is what I want for my daughter in life: I want her to be happy. I want her to do her best and achieve things, and reach her potential and all that Tiger Mother bullshit, but most of all, I want her to be happy with herself, her choices and her life. I’m not sure any of that is fully realized at age two, you know? I don’t care if your two-year-old is a Mensa candidate and can speak four languages beyond the fact that it makes you happy, and hopefully she’s happy … it has really very little to do with MY kid and how I perceive her successes and failures.

Even if your kid can speak Mandarin while painting elaborate Ukrainian eggs and knitting a sweater, I am STILL going to prefer my kid to yours, sorry. The same way that, say, I might possess more self-awareness than you by not rubbing my kid’s accomplishments in your face like an obnoxious one-upper, by some strange miracle, your child will still prefer you to me. THIS IS HOW THINGS WORK.

I’m rambling, and it probably isn’t making any sense. I just find some parents amusing is all, I suppose. Because once again, are we supposed to be JEALOUS of their CHILDREN and want to TRADE OURS IN FOR THEIRS? If only … If only I’d given birth to THAT KID instead!

Oh God.

You know what else is amusing? When Sam wakes up, she demands that Sunny get up too. Girlfriend is SO! EXCITED! about! Sunny! that she can’t keep it together until the dog comes out, reluctantly and very slowly. Mind you, this is a dog who, up until recently, woke up FOR THE DAY no earlier than noon, and now Sam’s rousing her by 7 at the latest. She’s … very tired. Sam, ever perceptive, realizes this, and by 8, is usually trying to make things right by giving Sunny a fluffy pillow, blanket, her juice and both remote controls.

“There you go, Sunny! There you go! Rest up!” She then covers Sunny with the blanket and tries to force her to take a drink from her sippy cup. “REST UP, SUNNY! JOOOOOOOOSE?”

Meanwhile, Sunny’s wondering what the hell happened to her cushy life. Having a baby hardly changed it at all, but having a toddler rocked her whole world, and not in a good way.

Friday night, Adam and I were in bed, just about to go to sleep, when I marveled at how long it had been since Sam, or any of her core group of little friends, have been sick. I talked about it at length! I marveled at her hardy nature!

GOD THIS IS SO STUPID. DO NOT EVER DO THIS.

Before I fell asleep, I heard her coughing, something she never does, and Saturday morning, she woke at an ungodly hour, flaming red, sweaty and sporting a pathetically high fever.

Streak ended, thanks to yours truly. We shall see which one of her friends is felled next, given that the whole group was HERE, at MY HOUSE, on Friday, day before the weekend sickopalypse. And it goes without really saying that I did this. It is all my fault. I BROUGHT THIS UPON US.

She’s fine now, but, ah, that was our weekend. How was yours?

OH WAIT, I lied … there was more excitement! We risked a trip to Microcenter, sick unhappy kid in tow (cabin fever, FTW! GENIUS PARENTING!), where Adam had a nerdgasm, and I marveled at the fact that a not-insignificant portion of the Microcenter-going MIT population is terminally nerdy, and not in the sexy way I always imagined. I mean, *I* am married to an attractive smart geeky-type who is good with things like circuits, computers and algorithms (oh my!), and I know plenty of hot MIT alums! Besides, on the tee vee, all the nerdy guys are like Patrick Dempsey in Can’t Buy Me Love. It’s nothing a little pomade can’t fix, amirite?

Wrong. WRONG WRONG WRONG. It turns out, the irredeemable nerd with the greasy hair, cable knit sweater and weirdly pube-like facial hair exists, and it’s likely that you can find him at Microcenter in Cambridge, hovering over the stacks of RAM.

There you have it. The most thrilling weekend in history.

But wait, Ken — is there more? YES! It can be made even more thrilling by the fact that I declared, out loud and everything, that I was going to “treat myself” to some high-end doggie poop bags. OMFG. TREAT MYSELF. TO A BAG THAT PICKS UP MY DOG’S SHIT. I made a big deal about buying them — Mutt Mitts — thinking how much easier they would make walking Sunny instead of those godawful recycled Stop & Shop bags that always have holes in the bottom, leaving my FINGERS to end up in my dog’s POOP! And how they would be worth the extra cost!

(They are.)

I … oh my God, I don’t even know where to start with this, except that I bought them this afternoon, and it’s taken me until JUST NOW to realize how sad it is that I consider dog waste bags a LUXURY ITEM. Look at ME! I think that I am WORTHY of not sticking my hand in animal feces! I think I missed a memo from L’Oreal or something, because my definition of being worth it comes in a package of $10 Mutt Mitts.

Someone also call the spa, because MAMA IS COMING IN FOR A MASSAGE. IT’S TIME.

I was reading TJ’s post and then some of the comments, and I was getting retroactively frustrated for my pregnant self back before I had Sam and super-frustrated for my pregnant friends. WHY do people want to terrify you while you’re pregnant? Why is there so much smug satisfaction in warning you of how HORRIBLE it’s going to be when you have your baby, and how you’re NEVER GOING TO SLEEP AGAIN and your life is basically OVER and GOOD LUCK, BIZNATCH! You done ruined your life, sister!

Why? Like, it’s too late. It does no good to be prepared for parenthood, because it’s one of those things you have to experience for yourself, and no amount of warning or discussion will help. It won’t help. All it will do is make you feel crappy about yourself for looking forward to the experience, when there are legions of people telling you all the reasons you shouldn’t. And the truth is, it will suck sometimes, but it is also completely awesome, otherwise NO ONE WOULD DO IT AGAIN. OR EVER. I want another baby. If it was so terrible, would I want to do it AGAIN?

(Don’t get me wrong, I think after two, we’re done. I do. I want more in theory, but on the other hand, I imagine the exhilaration in knowing that once my second kid starts sleeping through the night, that’s IT for the most part. THAT WILL BE IT, save for a few isolated nights here and there. I think about it and I actually get excited. And we are not even remotely at the beginning of baby #2, but seriously, I GET EXCITED ABOUT THAT.)

In other news, it’s freezing here, and if you think weather-related blogging is boring, I’ve got nothing for you, because it is CONSUMING ME, and I have a child who will not wear mittens, whines when her hood is up or her hat is on unless she’s in the damn HOUSE where it is WARM and you know what, lady at Sudbury Farms who suggested my kid should be wearing mittens? I KNOW. Perhaps you can walk with me and hold them on for us while we walk to the store? Or no, is that not a good idea?

But seriously, I’m a wimp right now, and I’m not sure what’s gotten into me. I moved back here from VERMONT, for God’s sake, where it is VERY COLD, being so close to Canada and all. (Oh, Canadians, I am just kidding! I know you have a diverse climate profile, but it is kind of fun to get you riled up and tell me how no one realizes you don’t all live in igloos!) And yet I’m out there bundled up like I’m on my way to meet Santa’s elves, bitching how the wind is like ice and how do people live like this? What are we doing here? Maybe we should move somewhere warm, like Florida?

OH HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

Ahem. Anyway, look, this is boring as shit, but I’m trying to get back into the habit of writing more often than, say, once a week, and it’s cold here, what do you want? I AM COLD. THIS IS THE BEST I CAN DO. Also, I failed to mention that in addition to our horrid, no-good flight from Virginia to Boston, we returned home to a dog who’d had a bloody colitis attack all over my sister’s house while we were gone. My sister, who I’d gotten into a pointless argument about, among other things, dog-sitting (!) before we left (long story, not a big deal, hormones were involved, the end) and then HO HO, HERE. Let my dog excrete bloody shit all over your first floor! That should really, um, clear the air.

(It did, ironically, but AUGH SUNNY WHAT THE FUCK?)

Do you know what we’re doing this weekend? LOOKING AT MINIVANS, THAT’S WHAT. A recent road trip with the dog, the baby and an assload of shit in the CR-V (our other car’s an Accord) made us want more space. A tour of a friend’s Odyssey has me daydreaming of THREE! ROWS! OF! SEATS!

So Adam had this Foot Thing, and it started out as a relatively familiar and minor Foot Thing involving pain and some kind of leg-crossing nerve thing he does when he codes (which I guess, as a VP-type, isn’t something you do all the time anymore, I don’t know), and he’s been coding a lot, and suddenly BADOW!, the guy can’t even WALK, and he gets up around 10 p.m. Friday night and his leg looked like it was about to EXPLODE and I … I kind of flipped my lid. I was all stormy and crazy and texting Megan that my husband was going to DIE OF A BLOOD CLOT if I didn’t get him to the hospital STAT and then I stormed into the bedroom and announced that he had TWO CHOICES, mister. I could CALL AN AMBULANCE or I could wake the baby and DRIVE HIM TO THE ER RIGHT NOW.

(I was a little crazy. I tend to get worked up about his health, and I don’t know WHY. I am solely responsible for sending him to the hospital at least three times. If we really want to dig deep, I think it’s because my (step) mom’s first husband died, leaving her a widow to a small kid, and … well, she’s made it through more than you can imagine (more than THAT, even) and she’s kind of amazing, but it still gets me, knowing it happened to her and really, the person you should pity is Adam, for he reaps the consequences.)

We talked it out, he talked me off the ledge and we went Saturday morning and it turns out, no one was dying, it was only a pinched nerve. But I’l tell you, the three hours we all spent in the ER were AWESOME.

AHEM.

So, ah, you know how people say that first children are a little like pancakes, in that you screw the first one up so badly that by the time the second one comes around, you end up with a much fluffier version that is probably easier to digest? Or spend time with? Or something? (This metaphor really isn’t working, is it?)

Our first child is our dog. And yes, I realize — FULLY REALIZE — how absurd that sounds, but let me tell you, we fucked this one up GOOD. If Sunny is a pancake, then she is a burnt disc of inedible, but lovable, proportions. Odd-shaped and unevenly cooked, and much more of a pain in the ass than it seems like she’s worth, and yet we soldier on, day after day, because we love her to pieces, and that’s just what you DO when you screw up so bad. You just live with your burnt, inedible consequences, I guess, and go hungry.

(Can you believe I’m totally sober writing this? Because I kind of can’t. This is like the rambling manifesto of the Krusteaz founder, after he’s knocked back a few Bud Lights.)

Sunny has never slept in our bed. Yes, this may seem cruel to some, but it’s not for lack of trying. She cannot — CANNOT — make it through the night in our bed. She gets too excited, and no one sleeps, least of all her, and while she can spend the entirety of the next day snoring on the couch (her usual pastime), the rest of us must soldier on with our days, despite having not slept a wink the night before, thanks to a panting wet snout snuffling around our eyeballs at 2, 3, 4 and 5 a.m. The digging usually happens on the half-hour, so the pattern is wet snuffling, digging, wet snuffling, digging, with some aimless wandering on our bodies mixed in there from time to time. There is no actual sleeping done by the dog OR the people in the bed. It is worse than having a newborn, and people, I know of bad newborns.

Besides, she LOVES her crate, which we must gingerly place her in each night after a bedtime ritual that is almost as complex as our not-yet-two-year-old DAUGHTER. (It involves her resting her head on our shoulder and demanding kisses and rubs in a very specific order, followed by the words, “Night, night, Sunny.” Otherwise, she WILL NOT GO TO BED.) (I CANNOT BELIEVE I JUST ADMITTED THAT TO THE INTERNET.)

You see how we messed this up, yes? YOU SEE?

(Side note: Sam can’t sleep in our bed either for the same reasons. Ever since she became attached to her crib, she thinks of our bed as PARTY TIME! and even when we WANT her to sleep with us, she cannot, although the consequences are far more irritating than a wet snout in the ear, let me tell you.)

Until we actually shut the lights, however, Sunny snuggles in our bed, either chewing a bone or catching up on her rest (a girl’s gotta get her nineteen hours in!), and though she’s been going to bed quite happily around 10:30 or 11 (after her proper night-nights), around 1 a.m., she’s been WAILING and CRYING and then, when I panic and take her out to see if she had to go to the bathroom, realizing that HO HO, no — she was demanding to come into bed with us, where she pulls the wet snout/dig pattern ALL NIGHT LONG and OH MY GOD ARE YOU SERIOUS, WE ARE SO VERY TIRED.

All this is how I ended up putting her in her crate and soothing her every five, ten and then fifteen minutes, until finally, extinction.

And though I joked about it earlier, I didn’t realize until I actually did it that I had to, oh my God, FERBERIZE MY DOG. WHAT THE EFF. Like, I used a combination of CIO methods from him AND Weissbluth. HAHAHA. AM PATHETIC.

It worked. She sleeps through the night now. I’m totally calling Dr. Ferber to see if he’ll add a canine chapter in there.

Thus endeth the lamest post ever, but look, it’s Thanksgiving week, I spent the weekend in the ER with a man who could hardly WALK and I’m just LUCKY WE ARE ALL ALIVE.

Happy Tuesday!

PS, did you know that I’m everywhere but here on Mondays? Every other Monday, I’m at Draft Day Suit, and every SINGLE Monday, I am at Food Lush and Style Lush, where I am an editor also. I am the worst at adding buttons and/or an about page because I keep telling myself that I’m going to redesign the site, but OH LOOK. WE ARE STILL HERE IN THE SAME DESIGN I HAD IN 2005. TWO THOUSAND FIVE. THAT IS THE LAST TIME I REDESIGNED THIS THING.

As we speak right now, there is a FIGHT brewing on one of my Facebook friends’ pages about the superiority of cats vs. dogs. I’m watching it all and thinking that THIS! This is what’s wrong with the Internet. People are upset! People are saying mean things! And I don’t even know where to go with this, frankly, except to say, uh, wow, we’re talking about pets, not children or even mosques, for frak’s sake.

Speaking of dogs, oh HO HO HO, Sunny’s back at it with her shenanigans, and by shenanigans, I mean the pooping of the blood and other sundry asshole-related things, this time because she got super worked up after I took out the garbage. I TOOK OUT THE GARBAGE. My dog is of such a sensitive petite little flower nature that I can’t TAKE OUT THE GARBAGE without her coming completely and totally unglued and POOPING BLOOD ALL OVER MY FLOORS.

So I called the vet again (OH AGAIN) to see if we could get her back on a third round of the medication that, in my totally professional opinion, because I am a Google-certified VETERINARIAN, she should be on full-time at a very low dose, and do you know how aggressive I have to get for them to listen to me? It’s like they think it’s just PERFECTLY FINE for my dog to poop blood all over my house! Don’t worry, it’s not life threatening, they explain politely. She’s fine! If it keeps up, just bring her in for some IV fluids!

This is dropped all casual-like, as though, a) blood all over my floor is no big deal; and b) dropping $250 for IV fluids every month or so is ALSO no big deal, and it was at this point that I was like, LISTEN, I CANNOT GO ON LIKE THIS. THERE IS BLOODY MUCUSY SHIT ALL OVER MY FLOOR.

(Side note: I have bleached and Nature’s Miracled, and it’s all clean, friends who visit, I swear.)

It is at this point that the vet got irritated with me and asked rather snottily if I was considering putting Sunny to sleep, and that to do so for something so minor would be unreasonable.

Ding dong, whaaa? I mean, call me crazy, but I can’t help but feel like I’m allowed to get a little irate when I’ve spent an entire afternoon cleaning up what bore an uncanny resemblance to Talbot’s geleed urned remains. It doesn’t mean I want animals to DIE, it means GIVE ME THE PILLS. THE PILLS. THE PILLLLLLZZZZZZ.

I got the pills, but my God. MY GOD.

This following a few days of horrendous guilt as you may have seen, because I spent all of last weekend complaining that my kid was acting like a tiny piece of whining toddler totalitarian hell, when it turns out she was SICK. SICK! With hand, foot and mouth disease! Which, if you didn’t know, is the grossest disease ever! It involves OPEN MOUTH SORES! BLERRRRRRGHHHH.

Also, I think it goes without saying that not only did I treat her tantrums as … well, tantrums, but I gave her ORANGES for breakfast that day, THEN took her to playgroup, THEN got home and realized she was approximately the temperature of a wood stove, THEN noticed her mouth resembled my lips after my first herpes infection and … once again, Mother of the Year, FTW!

Update: Kid has hand, foot and mouth disease. Which may contribute to her assholery. OH DUH.

Thank you for all of your comments on my last post. Because MAN, I felt like I was drowning for a little while there, and dammit, if today we didn’t have THIRTEEN tantrums. THIRTEEN! FULL-BORE! TANTRUMS! With kicking! And throwing herself on the ground to complete said kicking! BAHAHA HAHAHA. HAHAHAHAHAHA

OMFG.

I mean, intellectually, as a parent you know this is coming, right? But when it happens, it’s still just so STUNNING. Also, I will admit that one of the things I’m struggling with is some leftover PTSD from when she was an infant and cried all day, every day. Uncontrolled crying? MUST STOP IT, STAT. This means I spent the first several weeks after the tantrums began GIVING IN to the tantrums, trying to figure out what was wrong. OH HO HO HO, genius move, right there. This, friends, I believe is the reason that we have EXTRA tantrums. Manufactured stress, for the win! Parenting skills worth repeating! RIGHT HERE.

Sorry to go on like this. It’s just so ALL CONSUMING, as you know. And worse, I’m starting to think that I’m just not creative enough for this parenting shit. I run out of activity ideas after the first hour of the day, and then I’m left scrambling, with a tantrummy kid, thinking that surely, there has to be some sort Parent Emergency Pill, like a cyanide-type one used in combat (can you tell I’m reading Mockingjay?), only it doesn’t kill you, but maybe sends some kind of ALERT ALERT WOOP WOOP to the local Parenting Squad and someone — anyone — will swoop in and deposit a nanny or at least someone who knows their way around Play Doh for a few minutes.

Seriously, let’s add “Difficult to Play With” under the challenges of 18 months. Too little to sit still for any sort of prolonged activity (drawing, Play Doh); too big to just feel up a bunch of toys and watch them crinkle, you know?

You know. And you are over hearing about it. ME TOO. WHERE IS MY PILL?

Good thing she’s cute, is all I’m saying, am I right?

Totally worth it, I am embarrassed to admit.

In other scintillating news (wow, our lives are THRILLING these days), Sunny’s Stomach Ailment of Mystery reared its ugly head on Saturday night/Sunday morning, as I woke up at 4:30 a.m. to Adam using a miniature flashlight (so considerate, that man of mine, God bless him) to clean up more of her puke, and HOO BOY, I feel terrible for her, but we are also a bit on the Over It side. And obviously, though it was planned that I would sleep late on Sunday and Adam would take Sam out and about, that was jettisoned, because it’s an unspoken rule that whoever cleans up the puke gets to sleep late, end of story. Especially if the puke happens at 4:30 a.m.

Adam slept later than he had in years, and I don’t know that there is anyone who deserved it more. Seriously, he cleaned up PUKE, in the DARK at FOUR IN THE MORNING. And was a ninja-like, so as not to wake me! Awww.

I’ve taken a bit of a television hiatus, in terms of finding new shows, anyway, because it’s summer, we’ve been busy, and whatever, there’s Big Brother, mock me if you will. But every night before we went to bed, Adam would watch It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia and shake the damn bed with laughter while I glared at him in an obnoxious highbrow manner over the top of my book.

He finally broke me down, and PEOPLE. I CANNOT STOP. It’s easily the funniest, most wildly inappropriate show I’ve seen in years. I’m howling! I’m crying! I’m feeling terribly dirty because I’m laughing uproariously at the absurd pleasure the characters are taking in finding — and trying on — a Nazi uniform, and that sounds worse than it is, kind of, but you must trust me: HILARITY ENSUED. I … oh, it’s terrible and hilarious and so offensive, while at the same time smartly acknowledging its offensiveness, and, well, I feel like everyone should go get it and watch it. Unless you’re very sensitive, in which case, I don’t know what to tell you, because it’s possible you’re reading the wrong blog, maybe? I’m not sure.

Anyway. I have failed to mention that Sunny once again continues to be the bane of our existence, while also managing to be the primary sleep-stealer, making up for all those months that a squalling baby kept her from her deep puggy slumber. While I was at BlogHer, she was overcome with such a disastrous stomach ailment that Adam was up every two hours (like a NEWBORN) to take her outside to either barf or poop, and to be honest, the majority of the baby wipes in this house were being used to WIPE THE DOG’S BUM.

THE DOG’S BUM.

THE DOG’S BUM.

This is how, upon my return, I ended up waiting in a 24-hour pharmacy for a prescription to be filled for my dog. A dog whose prescription was borked (barked?) on four separate occasions because the pharmacist not only could not find my dog as an existing patient in the insurance database (BECAUSE SHE IS A DOG), but was consistently trying to fill a prescription for a human named — wait for it:

Funny Rubin.

FUNNY RUBIN.

After waiting and calling and waiting and calling, and talking and waiting and mass confusion, the pharmacist, who to my knowledge has a DEGREE and everything, stopped and said, “Wait: are you Funny Rubin? I’ve been trying to call you!”

Aaaand, scene.

She finished her last pill today. This is her third round of this flora-encouraging antibiotic (a paradox if I ever heard one) and if I wake up in the middle of the night tonight to wipe her bum, I will seriously consider selling her to the highest bidder. Or perhaps the first person willing to buy me a jumbo pack of Starburst. Whichever.

In other housekeeping-y news, a few of us are in the process of putting together a Boston blogger (and the readers who love them) meet-up. As a result, would you kindly let me know, either in the comments, or via email (the contact form above does go to my email, swearsies), so that we can keep you in the loop, as the kids say?

Also, HA HA, embarrassing fun fact: A reader recognized me in Barnes & Noble a few weeks ago, and she was adorable and funny and a mom! A mom of two! Who lives kind of near me! And I loved her, even though I was shocked and sort of stammer-y, for it happens so rarely to begin with, but it happens even MORE rarely that someone recognizes MY DAUGHTER before they realize who I am. And yes, I had to ask her name TWICE because I was so flustered and … well, so I said we should get together sometime! And she should email me her contact information!

No email. Sad panda. Which goes to show you that apparently there are times — quite a few of them, I reckon — that I translate very poorly in person. So attend the meet-up at your own risk.

(CALL ME, JOANNA. NOT TO SOUND DESPERATE OR ANYTHING.)

(Ha ha?)

Happy Wednesday!

*Biz Markie. Who is coming with DJ Lance and the Yo Gabba Gabba clan to Boston, and I’m totally considering buying tickets and … oh dear. They are not cheap. This is not rational, right? I mean, she might freak out! She might not make it! AND YET. DJ LANCE IN THE FLIZESH. *fans self*

HA! Well, I don’t feel like such a dirty bird anymore. Truth is, I’ve washed my bathmats … twice? Three times? since we moved here, which was May 1. So … well, that’s less than some of you, more often than others, and honestly, I never spent much time thinking about DRIED PEE DUST, as so many of you have, and … dried pee dust? For real?

Now, I am sensitive to the pee molecule. I will never, and I mean NEVER, have a toilet seat made of anything that is not hard, non-porous, and able to be disinfected with a swipe of the product of your choice. This means nothing squashy, nothing fabric, and for the love of the baby Jesus, no FUR. Adam’s aunt has a squashy, furry toilet seat and I REFUSE to sit on it, because I AM SORRY. FUR HAS PEE. MUCH PEE. AND PROBABLY POOP TOO.

But bathmats … well, I don’t know. Mine are rubber-backed, and I just wash and dry them, which, I am told, could cause my entire house to either smell like rubber OR spontaneously combust, so if I disappear one day, it’s because I blew us all up washing out some stupid pee molecules in the damn machine. The news will simply report an explosion, but you’ll all know the real story.

ANYWAY, so yes, Sunny got her ass kicked by the neighbor’s dog on Friday night, and it was dark and stormy and we were on our FOURTH walk of the evening, because for a dog who likes to blow the contents of her but out on a semi-regular basis, sometimes she is just so goddamn PICKY about WHERE this assplosion happens, and I’m wondering how it’s possible that our floor is acceptable, but when she goes outside, it has to be in the PRECISE PIECE OF GRASS she’s been seeking for twentysomething minutes.

So there we are, trudging through a lightning storm, while I’m FREAKING OUT, because I am afraid of lightning and thunder, and I really believe that I’m going to be struck down and killed by my bra which is, for the record, the reason I no longer wear underwire, no matter HOW Braless African Villager these puppies get after nursing, and I’m sorry, where was I? OH YES — this … this THING just shot out of nowhere and ATE HER and SHOOK HER and AH! AH! AH! I was yelling AHHHHH! and then AHHHHH! and “ARE YOU KIDDING ME?” and THAT was really helpful, all that yelling! Because YELLING peels a dog off of another dog! And right, of course RIGHT! I was just being punked! HA HA!

The dog’s … owner? handler? came shooting out, apologizing, claiming he got off the leash, when I’m sorry, THERE WAS NO LEASH ATTACHED and it is at this point that I do NOT need to tell you we’ve had two days of bloody diarrhea, right? RIGHT?

It turns out it was a pet sitter who let the dog escape, AND it turns out the owners are lovely people who are aware of their dog’s, uh, less than friendly feature, and I’d say all’s well that end’s well (uh, they want to be friends, it seems, and I LIKED THEM), except that I still have a dog who poops copious amounts of blood and (SORRY) mucus onto the floor, and no amount of friendly neighborhood barbecues are going to fix THAT little problem, let me tell you.

Speaking of mucus, did you know that mucous is adjectival, while mucus is a noun? This is something I, an actual no-shit professional editor, learned only recently, most likely because I can count on less than one hand the amount of documents I’ve edited that feature mucus, unless you count this here blog, which includes mucus more than anyone would like. As does my life.

Bottom line, Sunny’s on a low-dose antibiotic that supposedly heals up the freaky ulcers, and if that doesn’t work, she’s going on Prozac. Yes, Prozac. YES, MY DAMN DOG.

And with that, let’s all go to our happy places, which for me is a tiny person giving me a cheesy fake smile (SHE DOES THIS FOR THE CAMERA) while playing in her plastic pool. Wearing pajamas.

Oy, so OY. Many of you know this thanks to Twitter, but … oh man. Sunny. MAN. I didn’t know they were such high strung little beings, I really didn’t. And you know, all those people who tell you that having a dog is NOTHING like having a baby, let me just say that my dog has been exactly like a child, when it comes to the ass-pain factor. In the last six months, I’ve had more than one sleepless night thanks to the little shit darling, and look, I’m down with my kid pulling this stuff, but my dog is a grown-up. A GROWN-UP. For goodness’ sake, she’s 34 in dog years! She’s MY AGE. The prime of her life!

AND YET.

Without killing you with detail, she had some bloody, uh, stuff, the other night. Then, suddenly it was all blood, and my entryway looked like a small family of rabbits was murdered and then stealthily eaten in their entirety by some kind of predator. At that point, I realized that perhaps the emergency vet might be a good idea, because, well, that’s not normal. It was decided that I would go, because I am totally not grossed out by anything, as it turns out, even copious amounts of blood shooting from my dog’s ass. Even when it gets on my HANDS, for chrissake, it seems I just CARRY ON.

It’s good to learn about yourself, I think.

The vet is in Waltham, which is a large-ish town that is both nice in areas and SO COMPLETELY SKETCHY in others (not unlike the town where I reside, frankly), and while I was thrilled to find out I was in the mostly un-sketchy area of Waltham, I was NOT thrilled to find out that even if an emergency vet clinic is located next to David Ortiz’s house in tony Weston, there will be the sketchiest people you’ve ever seen in your life in there. My GOD, people. There was yelling! Hysteria! BLOOD! Dog blood! Scary people looking VERY ANGRY and like they’re about to cut a bitch! A totally thuggy and terrifying bald white dude who looked like he was THISCLOSE to joining the nearest Nazi organization, if his tattoos were any indication, was in with his girlfriend, her mother and their (oh I am sorry to say this, as I hate stereotyping dogs) pit bull, who had, as it turned out, bitten his fourth victim. Police were involved. Euthanasia was recommended.

WAILING ENSUED. At one point, the girlfriend ran out of the clinic screaming, “BABY MURDERERS!” which, when you think about it, is a bit ironic considering that it was HER dog who bit a kid and … well, there’s no use nitpicking now, is there? Two other dogs came in, one bleeding, one having a seizure, and by this point, Sunny had bled all over the floor and OH, I WAS DONE. SO DONE. What started out feeling like a little kid-free vacation (how sad that a waiting room now holds allure) was quickly turning into a bloody nightmare, and seriously, who expects this at an emergency vet?

The net/net of all this is that my dog, MY DOG, has stress-induced ulcerative colitis. And while I’m ready to admit that an interstate move is probably stressful on a dog, I am not yet ready to fully grasp how I am supposed to reduce the stress of this dog’s life, which is what the vet tasked us with. Come on. OH COME ON.

Would the lady of the house desire a manicure? Would she prefer fresh beef instead of kibble?

Seriously, people. Seriously! What am I to do? What kind of DOG gets … colitis? FROM STRESS.

I … I’m lost here. And yet, I also feel terrible for Sunny, getting herself worked up into such a state that she just POOPS BLOOD. It’s the lawnmowing that really does her in, is the thing. And yet, short of getting blackout shades on all the doors and windows, I cannot shield her from this reality. REALITY IS HARD, SUNNY. GRASS GROWS.

In other news, swimming lessons for Sam went reasonably well, despite all of my anxiety — we were at a low-grade whimper throughout, but there was no all-out screaming, and for that, I am grateful, and consider it a rousing success.

Gym class, however, took a terrible turn for the worse, when a Russian newcomer spied Sam’s toddler-walk, declared her pigeon-toed, and announced in a heavy accent that “She vill neet leck bresses! From HEEP TO VAIST! That child EES PEEJUN-TOAD! Is VEDDY VEDDY DANGERUSS!”

And then she kind of left. Which was awesome. Thanks, angry Russian Gym Grandmother! We’re all over that shit!

(Except not really, because Sam just learned to walk two months ago, and this is totally normal and FOR THE LOVE, LADY. FOR THE LOVE.)

The other night we had thunderstorms, and Sunny was up until … 2:30 a.m. What the FUCK, you guys? I love my dog — really, I do — but the percentage of dog-to-baby night wakings in the last six months has tilted in the direction of the DOG. THE DOG. THE DOG. We’ve had night puking! Kennel cough! Thunderstorms!

THUNDERSTORMS. She was up all night crying, refusing to go to bed, making a thousand trips in and out of the baby’s room, waking the baby and .. and so on, until 2:45, when she was finally too tired to fight anymore. It goes without saying that Sam woke up at 5:30, right? Right, of course it does. Right. If there was a way for me to score myself a trip to the emergency room by scooping out my own damn eyeballs, let me tell you, I would have gladly done it. Gladly.

I mean, Jesus, we lived in Florida, where it thundered on an hourly basis. What pansy-ass dog have we raised, who can’t handle a little lightning without coming uneffing GLUED, right? Especially when she was BORN in the lightning capital of the world, what the everloving EFF?

It’s a good thing she’s cute and sweet, and doesn’t ever complain when the baby plays with her ears, because no matter how many times we admonish, “GENTLE! GENTLE!”, sometimes those ears get pulled. And instead of biting or lashing out, Sunny’s solution is to roll over, belly-up, crying uncle and licking Sam’s face. She’s a keeper, that one, even if we’re all so goddamn exhausted from her infantile shenanigans.

But still, my God, I don’t think anyone guesses or anticipates that one of the most annoying things about parenthood isn’t the baby. It’s the DOGS. And yet, this is such a universal feeling — every single one of my be-petted friends, and I mean EVERY SINGLE ONE, has reported hating their dogs at some point, particularly in the early days. I think it’s that babies suck every last drop of inconveniently-timed nurturing out of us, that by the time the dog needs something (AT 2 A.M., JESUS), we’re fresh out of giving a shit.

(Not that Sunny wants for anything. Please. Bitch be snuggled up in my armpit as I type this.)

Look, I kind of got nothin’, as we’re heading back to Boston early next week. This trip involves the oh-my-fuck search for housing if we end up having to go there and … well, THAT should be fun, trekking all over the major metro area in my sister’s minivan with my kid strapped in the back seat. See also: Looking at houses with no idea if you’re actually going to live there or not, because you don’t know if you’re moving, or not, but you have to look because if you ARE going to move, you have to do it SUPER FAST and … blergh, is really all that is. BLERGH.

You know what else is blergh? Owning a house in Florida that is basically unsellable. That is MEGA BLERGH. I kick around what to do with this albatross on a hourlydaily weekly basis, and it almost always involves palm sweating and high blood pressure. The issue, for those new to the story, is this: We bought a house in Florida when we lived there, for a (very) reasonable, affordable below-market price. To live in, not to flip. We lived in it. Market exploded, then imploded. Work brought us back up north. Large percentage of neighbors paid three times what we did for similar houses in our development (Would YOU pay not far from a million dollars for a 2,000 sq foot, 3bd, 2ba TOWNHOME? No. No, you would not. So why did some of them buy THREE at that price?) Said assholejerkface investors with truckloads of capital and no intention to live in the house unfortunate “neighbors” are now foreclosing, leaving homes in our neighborhood selling for $100K or less.

Yes, really. Oh, foreclosure! You’re such a good deal!

Ergo, we are stuck with this sucker (which is rented out at a small loss, currently, such is the sad state of the Floridian market) and it makes me rather, um, enraged. Because we could end up in a short sale or something similar, which ends up pummeling your credit while simultaneously involving a significant amount of ASS PAIN, but because it’s not our primary residence, we qualify for approximately none of the housing “fixes,” like mortgage modification, principal reduction, etc. But what’s the alternative? Owning this thing for another 20 years, when the market returns? Meanwhile, its mere existence on our balance sheet saps our will to live?

And there is no one to blame! No one saw this coming! OK, fine: I blame banks. And people who bought six houses with no intentions of living in any of them. But still! STILL!

So now we may be off going somewhere else and likely renting again until we figure out what to do with this thing, and OH I AM SO SICK OF IT. I am sick of being a homeowner, a tenant AND a landlord. It is by far the most exhausting combination, on this you must trust me. And while yes, it’s possible that we could afford to buy another house WHILE still owning our Florida house, let me tell you, THAT is the only combination that is more lethal than the one I’ve got now. Yes, let me own TWO houses while being a landlord and … oh my God, just institutionalize me now, why don’t you, please. Just get out the straitjacket and throw me overboard.

I’m sorry, that’s obviously not why you came here, is it? Clearly I’m a little stressed by all this (along with other thrilling blogger events of last week), as just this morning, I dreamed that there was some sort of blogger playdate, and I remember that the Artist Formerly Known As Schnozz was there (she doesn’t have children), along with Amalah and Anna and Jennie and … my dad had an affair with a friend of Amy’s, and somehow her friend ended up pulling a gun and there was a SHOOTING. A SHOOTING! At a playdate! But it was fine, because our kids were wearing kevlar and … oh, it’s so blatantly obvious that I need to relax, right? RELAX. Like Frankie says. It will all work out.

After all, I have my retirement home bought already and everything! Florida, here we come!